NAIROBI, Kenya (CU)_With the rollout of a new AI-powered tool called Kuzi, African farmers are now able to prepare for locust swarms up to three months in advance.
It is reported that a swarm of 80 million locusts can consume food sufficient to feed 35,000 people a day. Therefore, Kuzi is a tool which generates a real-time heat map of locusts across Africa, and thereby predicts the breeding and migration routes of locusts across countries spanning the Horn of Africa and East Africa.
The tool, which uses machine learning, along with satellite data, soil sensor data and ground meteorological observation, would identify the formation of locust swarms and sends farmers SMS alerts up to three months in advance of when locusts are highly likely to attack their farms.
According to the World Bank, last year, 23 countries across East Africa, the Middle East and South Asia experienced the most invasive locust outbreaks in the world.
In order to obtain the services of this tool, farmers are only required to sign up on Kuzi’s website by providing their name, mobile number and the GPS location of their farm.
According to John Oroko, chief executive of Kuzi’s parent company, Selina Wamucii, the app, which is self-funded, intends to provide the SMS alerts as a free service for individual farmers. However, over time, the firm plans on introducing a payment system for organisations and cooperatives, which would also receive several additional services, including the possibility of licensing the software to build digital products such as insurance services based on Kuzi’s data.
Oroko said that locusts have exacerbating food insecurity for already vulnerable communities of millions of people across Eastern and Southern Africa, amid the significant economic downturn brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The tool is currently available for farmers in Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and Uganda, while the company also plans on expanding its services for those across the rest of the African continent. “We have a responsibility to develop and deploy locally bred solutions that address these challenges faced by our vulnerable rural communities,” Oroko said.
Selina Wamucii, the company which developed Kuzi, is a global innovator that uses technology to manage the produce grown by smallholder farmers across Africa.
